RAN A-4G+ Skyhawk 2002

Monday, November 10, 2014

Alien Isolation - the movie?

Hi guys. Well this morning at 6:30 am I finished Alien Isolation on Xbox 360. For me it was the most amazing experience. I loved every minute of it. I've been waiting a very long time to be able to play a game like this and I wasn't disappointed.

My interest in Alien actually began in 1978 when I read in The Sydney Morning Herald newspaper about a movie being made that was on a planet made out of bones! I was 15 years old at the time and this newspaper article sparked my imagination. When I finally got to see Alien it would be the first movie I ever went to see on my own, none of my friends were aloud to see it! As I stood in the foyer of the Regent Cinema in Wollongong, Australia, I was fascinated by the posters up on the wall from the movie. The poster that caught my attention more than any other was that of the Space Jockey. I'd never seen anything like it. Nobody had. What was it exactly? What was it sat in? A laser gun? A telescope?

Sitting there in the cinema closely following Kane as he made his way up the ledge and onto the platform........................... the camera pulls back...................... and there it is! It was such a pivotal moment in my life. I was stunned. Here it was, an alien life form. Nothing in the history of science fiction had ever produced anything like it, and nor has it since. The Space Jockey's ship, the architecture inside the ship, the cavernous chamber, was the stuff of amazement. Later on I was to learn about an artist by the name of H R Giger who created all of these things and of course the Alien itself.

As for Kane, well, yes, he just had to look into the open egg now didn't he! The Alien itself was also amazing. Walking out of the cinema that day I was energised in a way I'd never been before. I became interested in Science like never before, in writing. Learning about how movies are made, the actors, all of it. I'd watched Star Wars two years before and I also immersed into that, but nothing like I did Alien. That grungy grimy dirty version of science fiction. The space ship design, the graphics, the alien life forms, it was all new to me and I just dove into it buying everything I could afford at the time and collecting whatever I could ever since.

Since then we've had Aliens which is also a favourite, then Alien 3 which I hated at first, but since watching the directors cut, like it as much as the first two. Then there was Alien Resurrection which, lets face it, was total shit! The latest, Prometheus, was amazing in so many ways, but ultimately I felt cheated and disappointed. Essentially Scott and company took Giger's designs and cheapened them. Ultimately few people appreciated that. To take something as amazing as the Space Jockey and turn it into a buff white guy in a costume/space suit was ridiculous.

So then we were left with what next? The prospects of Prometheus 2 doesn't excite me much as I feel that story line ruined so much that was built up in the first three movies of the franchise. Then I began to hear stories of another "Alien" game. After the disappointing Aliens: Colonial Marines I cautiously wondered what it could be about? The more I read the more I became interested. The initial visuals looked very familiar. Something good was being made! Cautious hope turned to excitement as some of the first game play footage was released.

To read/hear that the Creative Assembly had worked on Alien Isolation for three years gave me hope that it would be something quite special. It is! Now I must confess that I'm not much of a "gamer" I just simply don't have the spare time for it. However as I began playing Alien Isolation I couldn't help but find myself drawn deeper and deeper into it. How could one not? The sheer amount of visual information in front of one's eyes was epic! Fortunate enough to be able to play it on a brand new 55" Smart TV I found myself sucked into the environments of Sevastopol Station in totality. The fear, the anxiety, the frustration! That sweet perfect combination of superb set design, graphic design, story, sound and music was all encompassing. It wasn't just playing a game, it was an adventure. An adventure into something that harkened back to 1979, back to that little boy standing there in the cinema about to embark on something that would change his life. Here I was night after night fighting my way through Sevastopol Station as Ripley's daughter surrounded by things new and yet at the same time oh so familiar.

More than once I found myself being killed by either a Working Joe, a human or an alien, because I was stopped staring at the surroundings in awe! I could see Ron Cobb's influences everywhere. I loved how the story built as you read the events catalogued on the computers. Ellen Ripley's last message to her daughter was a nice touch. The story is simply amazing! Very plausible and it opens up the "Alien universe" in so many ways, ways I thought that were much more intelligent than what Prometheus tried to do.

A big thank you to the Creative Assembly for the opportunity to walk on LV426 and go inside the derelict, meet the Space Jockey and have a good look around. That was all quite unexpected and came as a genuine surprise. You couldn't wipe the smile off my face as I took it all in. Simply amazing!

So, having finished it I must say I sat there reading through the credits feeling utterly exhausted. I really felt like I'd been on quite an adventure. And I know I haven't really finished it yet because I've got Survivor mode to get to grips with, then the Nostromo edition to start and then there's the rest of the downloadable content to come. Wow, its a game that just keeps on giving! Then there's that not so small matter of what happens next to Amanda? Is it the Colonial Marshals with a rescue team that have showed up? Or a Seegson Corporation vessel? A Weyland-Yutani ship? Or some other ship?

This leads me to the title of this blog entry. Alien Isolation - the movie. I for one would love to see this story made into a motion picture! BUT! Only if Kezia Burrows plays Amanda Ripley. I couldn't stand it if another actress got the part.

Lets face it. She is gorgeous. She'd be so interesting to watch on the big screen, going through all she goes through in the game. Then there's the rest of the game cast. Surly that is a pre-approved movie cast? Then there's the set design, graphic design, music score, sound effects. THE STORY! It's all there ready to be utilised.

Think of the potential audience you'd have. Older people like myself who saw the original Alien back in 1979 right up to the young gamers playing the game now. My youngest son, who is eight years old is slowly playing his way through the game. My oldest, she is twenty loves it too and would also be happy to see it as a movie. My wife, who is not a gamer at all, is also excited by the prospect of Alien Isolation being made into a movie.

It would open the franchise up to so many more possibilities. Figures, scale models, comics, books, art books (yes I've got The Art of Alien: Isolation. It is amazing!)

Great article. Would love a movie too, in the same veins as this game or the 1979 Alien movie. But would also be happy even if they continued the story in a game as long as the same formula's intact. Go AI2! Keeping fingers crossed.